PRESS RELEASE — Tuesday, August 3, 2010
For Information Call Anne Peterson at 208-373-7368
or Bob Evancho at 373-7369
Independent Documentary Revisits One of Idaho’s Most Overlooked Conflicts; Airs on IdahoPTV
— Airs August 10 (Tuesday) at 9:00 p.m. MT/PT
An Idaho documentary producer’s film about a small Idaho Native American tribe facing down the federal government is showcased on Idaho Public Television in August.
Director-producer Sonya Rosario’s one-hour documentary, IDAHO’S FORGOTTEN WAR: A LOST TALE OF COURAGE, airs on Idaho Public Television on August 10 (Tuesday) at 9:00 p.m. MT/PT. Rosario of R.I. Productions in Meridian, highlights the bloodless war that helped the Kootenai people rise from poverty to become a prosperous Indian nation.
The film examines the story of North Idaho’s Kootenai people who declared war on the United States government in 1974. Fearing the extinction of her people was imminent, Amy Trice, chairwoman of the 68-member tribe, led her people in a three-day war.
Until 1974, the Kootenai people were deprived of their lands, culture and hunting rights. The federal government took their land away, but because the tribe was not represented in the Hellgate Treaty, the government did not offer recognition or compensation to the tribe. They continued to live in poverty near the North Idaho town of Bonner’s Ferry until a tribal elder froze to death on a cold winter night in a decaying home provided by the federal government.
To Chairwoman Trice; that was the last straw. The war began with a picket line that demanded a 10-cent toll on a North-South highway that ran through the tribe’s land and resulted with federal recognition of the Kootenai tribe and 12-and-a-half acres of trust land.